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Veggie oil doesn’t cut heart disease risk

Butter might not be a health food, but researchers unearthed more evidence that replacing it with vegetable oils does not decrease risk of heart disease

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A research team led by scientists at the UNC School of Medicine and the National Institutes of Health has unearthed more evidence that casts doubt on the traditional “heart healthy” practice of replacing butter and other saturated fats with corn oil and other vegetable oils high in linoleic acid.

The findings, reported today in the British Medical Journal, suggest that using vegetable oils high in linoleic acid might be worse than using butter when it comes to preventing heart disease, though more research needs to be done on that front. This latest evidence comes from an analysis of previously unpublished data of a large controlled trial conducted in Minnesota nearly 50 years ago, as well as a broader analysis of published data from all similar trials of this dietary intervention.

The analyses show that interventions using linoleic acid-rich oils failed to reduce heart disease and overall mortality even though the intervention reduced cholesterol levels. In the Minnesota study, participants who had greater reduction in serum cholesterol had higher rather than lower risk of death.

“Altogether, this research leads us to conclude that incomplete publication of important data has contributed to the overestimation of benefits — and the underestimation of potential risks — of replacing saturated fat with vegetable oils rich in linoleic acid,” said co-first author Daisy Zamora, PhD, a researcher in the Department of Psychiatry at the UNC School of Medicine. More. Paper.(public access)

Yes, the famous file drawer problem. The cabinet tells no tales.

Who knows? Maybe they’ll rehabilitate lard some day. Then one can go back to making really thin, crisp fresh fruit pie crusts the way they are supposed to be made.

I would eat butter even if the price to pay was a few years less life.

eMan14

Butter may actually be less harmful for you than margarine.

canminuteman

I’m pretty sure it is. We have been making butter since we domesticated cattle. If you believe in evolution it should follow that the people who are around today are the people who could thrive on the things that we have been eating since we invented agriculture. Butter, beef, bread.

The Butterfly

Everything they ever told you about diet was a lie. And not a single person will lose their job over it.

Kathy Prendergast

I grew up in a part of Canada (Saskatchewan) where bannock, which is traditionally cooked over an open fire and is made with flour, salt, baking power, water, and copious quantities of lard, is practically a staple food for most of the sizable aboriginal population. Do NOT try telling them, and the many non-aboriginals who also love bannock, that they should make it with something “healthier” than lard.

canminuteman

Bannock is exactly the same recipe as a scone, or tea biscuit, except cooked differently, When we go camping we pre mix all the dry ingredients then just add water to make a dough out of it. We then either fry it in a pan or cook it over a fire on a stick. I look forward to doing it again soon.

Kathy Prendergast

You’re right, the recipe and (I think) even the name bannock actually comes from Scotland originally – I’m not even sure if the Plains Indians made any kind of “bread” to speak of before European contact, certainly they didn’t have wheat flour – but in the three or more centuries since it was introduced by the first Scottish fur traders the aboriginals have pretty much laid claim to it as their own, and I won’t begrudge them that.

H

OK – I am giving up on trying to eat “healthy” foods: it’s pepperoni and bacon pizzas from here on out. Oh, and with a nice cold (healthy) lager to go with them.